Monday, July 10, 2006

We Still Wear The Mask

We Still Wear The Mask

By Dr.William Jelani Cobb

We could have known that it would come to this way back in 1896. Thatwas the year that Paul Lawrence Dunbar dropped a jewel for the ages,telling the world that "we wear the mask that grins and lies." Thepoet's point was that beneath the camouflage of subservient smiles,black folks of the Jim Crow era were hiding a powder keg of otheremotions, waiting patiently for the chance to detonate. The thing is,Dunbar never got the chance to spit bars with 50 Cent or throw in aguest collabo on a Mobb Deep album. If he had, then he would've knownthat grins and lies were only half the story.

These days, camouflage is the new black. Glance at hip hop for lessthan a second and it becomes clear that the music operates on a singlehope: that if the world mistakes kindness for weakness it can also beled to confuse meanness with strength. That principle explains whythere is a permanent reverence for the thug within the music; it iswhy there is a murderer's grit and a jailhouse tat peering back at youfrom the cover of damn near any CD you picked up in the last fiveyears. But what hip hop can't tell you, the secret that it would justas soon take to its deathbed is that it this urban bravado is a guise,a mask, a head-fake to shake the reality of fear and powerlessness inAmerica. Hip hop will never admit that our assorted thugs and gangstasare not the unbowed symbol of resistance to marginalization, but themost complacent and passive products of it.

We wear the mask that scowls and lies.

You could see which way the wind was blowing way in the early 90s whenDr. Dre was being ripped off by white Ruthless Records CEO JerryHeller, and nonetheless got his street cred up by punching and kickingDee Barnes, a black woman journalist, down a flight of stairs. In thislight, hip hop's obsessive misogyny makes a whole lot more sense. Itis literally the logic of domestic violence. A man is abused by alarger society, but there are consequences to striking back at thesource of his problems. So he transfers his anger to an acceptableoutlet – the women and children in his own household, and byextension, all the black people who constitute his own community.

Nothing better illustrates that point than the recent Oprah Debacle.Prior to last month, if you'd heard that a group of rappers had teamedup to attack a billionaire media mogul you would think that hip hophad finally produced a moment of collective pride on par with theblack power fists of the 1968 Olympics. But nay, just more blackface.

In the past two months, artists as diverse as Ludacris, 50 Cent andIce Cube have attacked Oprah Winfrey for her alleged disdain for hiphop. It's is a sad but entirely predictable irony that the oneinstance in which hip hop's reigning alpha males summon the testicularfortitude to challenge someone more powerful and wealthy than theyare, they choose to go after a black woman.

The whole set up was an echo of some bad history. Two centuries ago,professional boxing got its start in America with white slaveholderswho pitted their largest slaves against those from competingplantations. Tom Molineaux. First black heavyweight champion came upthrough the ranks breaking the bones of other slaves and making whitemen rich. After he'd broken enough of them, he was given his freedom.The underlying ethic was clear: an attack on the system that has madea slave of you will cost you your life, but an attack on another blackperson might just be the road to emancipation.

The basis for this latest bout of black-on-black pugilism was Oprah'spurported stiff-arming of Ludacris during an appearance on her showwith the cast of the film Crash. Ludacris later complained that thehost had made an issue of lyrics she saw as misogynistic. Cube jumpedinto the act whining that Oprah has had all manner of racist flotsamon her show but has never invited him to appear – proof, in his mind,that she has an irrational contempt for hip hop. Then 50 threw in histwo cents with a claim that Oprah's criticism of hip hop was anattempt to win points with her largely white, middle class audience.All told, she was charged her with that most heinous of hip hop'sfelonies: hateration.

But before we press charges, isn't 50 the same character who openlyexpressed his love for GW Bush as a fellow "gangsta" and demanded thatthe black community stop criticizing how he handled Hurricane Katrina?Compare that to multiple millions that Oprah has disseminated to ourcommunities (including building homes for the Katrina families,financing HIV prevention in South Africa and that $5 million shedropped on Morehouse College alone) and the idea of an ex-crack dealerchallenging her commitment to black folk becomes even more surreal.

In spite of – or, actually, as a result of -- his impeccable gangstacredentials, 50 basically curtsied before a President who stayed onvacation for three days while black bodies floated down the NewOrleans streets. No wonder it took a middle-class preppie with anAfrican name and no criminal record to man-up and tell the whole worldthat "George Bush don't care about black folks." No wonder DavidBanner – a rapper who is just a few credits short of a Master's Degreein social work -- spearheaded hip hop's Katrina relief concerts, notany of his thug counterparts who are eternally shouting out the hoodsthey allegedly love.

The 50 Cent, whose music is a panoramic vision on black-on-blackhomicide, and who went after crosstown rival Ja Rule with thevengeance of a dictator killing off a hated ethnic minority dideverything but tap dance when Reebok told him to dismantle his pornproduction company or lose his lucrative sneaker endorsement deal.

But why single out 50? Hip hop at-large was conspicuously silent whenBush press secretary Tony Snow (a rapper's alias if ever there wasone) assaulted hip hop in terms way more inflammatory than Oprah'smild request:"Take a look at the idiotic culture of hip-hop and whaddya have? Youhave people glorifying failure. You have a bunch of gold-toothed hotdogs become millionaires by running around and telling everybody elsethat they oughtta be miserable failures and if they're really luckymaybe they can get gunned down in a diner sometime, like Eminem's oldrunning mate."

(We're still awaiting an outraged response from the thug community forthat one.) Rush Limbaugh has blamed hip hop for everything short ofthe Avian flu but I can't recall a single hip hop artist who has goneafter him lyrically, publicly or physically. Are we seeing a themeyet?

It's worth noting that Ludacris did not devote as much energy to BillO'Reilly -- who attacked his music on his show regularly and causedhim to lose a multi-million dollar Pepsi endorsement – as he did tocriticizing Oprah who simply stated that she was tired of hip hop'smisogyny. Luda was content to diss O'Reilly on his next record and goabout his business. Anyone who heard the interview that Oprah gave onPower 105.1 in New York knew she was speaking for a whole generationof hip hop heads when she said that she loved the music, but shewanted the artists to exercise some responsibility. But this responseis not really about Oprah, or ultimately about hip hop, either. It isabout black men once again choosing a black woman as the safest targetfor their aggression and even one with a billion dollars is still fairgame.

Of all their claims, the charge that Oprah sold out to win points withher white audience is the most tragically laughable. The truth is thather audience's white middle-class kids exert waaay more influence over50 and Cube than their parents do over Oprah. I long ago tired ofCube, a thirty-something successful director, entrepreneur and marriedfather of three children making records about his aged recollectionsof a thug's life. The gangsta theme went cliché eons ago, but Cube, 50and a whole array of their musical peers lack either the freedom orthe vision to talk about any broader element of our lives. The realityis that the major labels and their majority white fan base will notaccept anything else from them.

And there we have it again: more masks, more lies.

It is not coincidental that hip hop has made Ni@$a the most commonnoun in popular music but you have almost never heard any certifiedthug utter the word cracker, ofay, honky, peckerwood, wop, dago,guinea, kike or any other white-oriented epithet. The reason for thatis simple: Massa ain't havin' it. The word fag, once a commonplacederisive in the music has all but disappeared from hip hop'svocabulary. (Yes, these thugs fear the backlash from white gays too.)And bitch is still allowed with the common understanding that the termis referring to black women. The point is this: debasement of blackcommunities is entirely acceptable – required even – by hip hop'spredominantly white consumer base.

We have lived enough history to know better by now – to know thatgangsta is Sonny Liston, the thug icon of his era, threatening to killCassius Clay but completely impotent when it came to demanding thathis white handlers stop stealing his money. Gangsta is the black menat the Parchman Farm prison in Mississippi who beat the civil rightsworkers Fannie Lou Hamer and Annell Ponder into bloody unconsciousnessbecause their white wardens told them to. Gangsta is Michael Ervin,NFL bad boy remaining conspicuously mute on Monday Night Footballwhile Limbaugh dissed Donovan McNabb as an Affirmative Action athlete.Gangsta is Bigger Thomas with dilated pupils and every othersweaty-palmed black boy who saw method acting and an attitude as histicket out of the ghetto.

Surely our ancestors' struggles were about more than creatingmillionaires who could care less about us and then tolerating theirviolent disrespect out of a hunger for black success stories. Surelywe are not so desperate for heroes that we uphold cardboard iconsbecause they throw good glare. There's more required than that. Theweight of history demands more than simply this. Surely we understandthat these men are acting out an age-old script. Taking the TomMolineaux route. Spitting in the wind and breaking black bones. Hopingto become free.

By Dr. Cornel West (about Hip Hop, entertainers, the church, GWB, and the Black community in general)

On T.D. Jakes:"I had to talk to my dear brother T.D. Jakes. Yeah, we had a dialogue, y'all. Went out to dinner spoke four hours before we ordered salad. I love my dear brother. He has enriched my life. He really has. But I told him, 'Brother, I think you lack political courage.' He said 'Oh, brother West why would you say something like that to me? I said because 'I think it's true.' Interaction with the right wing televangelists is not a healthy thing for those who love justice. "

On George Bush:"Don't hate the man. Don't demonize the man. Talk about the effects and consequences of his policy."

On Some Megachurches:"You go to some of these churches today. You see two ATM's before you see a cross."

On Minister Farrakhan:"I love Minister Farrakhan. We just lovingly disagree. He has a deep love for black people. He's under death threats everyday. I just don't agree with all of his vision. I'm part of the King legacy. I'm going with Jesus. I've experienced something."

On the Golden Rule:"You can't love Jesus if you don't love your neighbor. Every neighbor -- not qualified by your finite mind. You know how some Christians are. They love their neighbors but not Negroes, Jews, gays, lesbians, Catholics. Everybody but your friends. You can't love your neighbor if you don't have a loathing for injustice."

On Materialism in the Black Middle Class:"One of the worst things the older generation told young folk: be successful, be successful as they broke the back of American apartheid and Jim and Jane Crow. Be successful. Be successful. They begin to think freedom is really about material choice. It's about personal security. No! Who told you that lie? It's about self respect and self regard and self determination. It's about service to others."

On Bill Cosby¦"My dear brother Bill Cosby who I love greatly. Comic genius but your language of correction must be informed by a language of compassion or they won't hear it that way. I know you love them but make sure you put that love upfront when you talk about irresponsibility."

On Oprah Winfrey ..."Embrace Oprah's entrepreneurial genius but ask for accountability in terms of her political courage."

On Kanye West¦Even Kanye West -- thank God for him -- gets real nervous speaking the truth from his soul. Say it, brother! You say it well in the studio. George Bush does not put a high priority on poor folks, especially black folks. Go on and say it with conviction. We got evidence."

On 50 Cent¦"Here comes a brother of infinite value, he calls himself two quarters, half a dollar, 50 Cent.Kanye's wrong about that. Kanye's wrong about that.' What are you saying 50 Cent? George Bush is in love with poor people? George Bush's policy highlights black people? C'mon 50 Cent. We know you got nine bullets in you. We praying for you. Why don't you speak the truth?"Cornel West

5 comments:

To add to this:By Dr. Cornel West (about Hip Hop, entertainers, the church, GWB, and the Black community in general)

On T.D. Jakes¦"I had to talk to my dear brother T.D. Jakes. Yeah, we had a dialogue, y'all. Went out to dinner spoke four hours before we ordered salad. I love my dear brother. He has enriched my life. He really has. But I told him, 'Brother, I think you lack political courage.' He said 'Oh, brother West why would you say something like that to me? I said because 'I think it's true.' Interaction with the right wing televangelists is not a healthy thing for those who love justice. "

On George Bush¦"Don't hate the man. Don't demonize the man. Talk about the effects and consequences of his policy."

On Some Megachurches¦"You go to some of these churches today. You see two ATM's before you see a cross."

On Minister Farrakhan¦"I love Minister Farrakhan. We just lovingly disagree. He has a deep love for black people. He's under death threats everyday. I just don't agree with all of his vision. I'm part of the King legacy. I'm going with Jesus. I've experienced something."

On the Golden Rule¦"You can't love Jesus if you don't love your neighbor. Every neighbor -- not qualified by your finite mind. You know how some Christians are. They love their neighbors but not Negroes, Jews, gays, lesbians, Catholics. Everybody but your friends. You can't love your neighbor if you don't have a loathing for injustice."

On Materialism in the Black Middle Class¦"One of the worst things the older generation told young folk: be successful, be successful as they broke the back of American apartheid and Jim and Jane Crow. Be successful. Be successful. They begin to think freedom is really about material choice. It's about personal security. No! Who told you that lie? It's about self respect and self regard and self determination. It's about service to others."

On Bill Cosby¦"My dear brother Bill Cosby who I love greatly. Comic genius but your language of correction must be informed by a language of compassion or they won't hear it that way. I know you love them but make sure you put that love upfront when you talk about irresponsibility."

On Oprah Winfrey ... "Embrace Oprah's entrepreneurial genius but ask for accountability in terms of her political courage."

On Kanye West¦ Even Kanye West -- thank God for him -- gets real nervous speaking the truth from his soul. Say it, brother! You say it well in the studio. George Bush does not put a high priority on poor folks, especially black folks. Go on and say it with conviction. We got evidence."

On 50 Cent¦"Here comes a brother of infinite value, he calls himself two quarters, half a dollar, 50 Cent.Kanye's wrong about that. Kanye's wrong about that.' What are you saying 50 Cent? George Bush is in love with poor people? George Bush's policy highlights black people? C'mon 50 Cent. We know you got nine bullets in you. We praying for you. Why don't you speak the truth?"Cornel West

There is a lot of responsibility attached to success. Both the commentary and the words of Dr. West put that idea in context. For all the history I've read the measure of black success is the triumph over other black people. It's not the progression beyond the collective average. Then too, this success is attached to material wealth. It is, in my opinion, the worst taught of all the civil rights lessons. For those of us who grew up better than average, whether we saw/interacted with those who had less or not, it is still difficult to understand success in a way that is not materialistic. But I guess that gets back to the underlying point of all statements like these: At the end of the day it's not about you. It's about all those who would come after you.

Yes this indeed was a very much needed article. But my question is, what are we supposed to do about this? Can we do anything? I mean are we supposed to stop purchasing music from artists that continue to degrade us? Do we have the ability to stop purchasing that music? I wonder if we would see any changes if the 50's, T.I.'s and Luda's actually read this article. Would they care? I'm sorry to say it, but I KNOW they wouldn't. So again, what do we do?

"For those of us who grew up better than average, whether we saw/interacted with those who had less or not, it is still difficult to understand success in a way that is not materialistic." Very well put Lauren. I don't think the civil rights movement taught us to determine success through materialism. I think it was interpreted that way and through popular culture it's been nurtured and shoved down our throats so much that we measure our worth and the worth of others based on chains, shoes, cars, and other stuff that's trivial.

JAC, I think you pose several very good questions: "are we supposed to stop purchasing music from artists that continue to degrade us? Do we have the ability to stop purchasing that music?"

I would have to say to question 1...YES. But question 2, I don't know. I love hip-hop and even I sometimes find myself mentally torn between listening to Little Brother or Scarface. Kanye or Beanie Sigel. But I buy it all b/c I love the music. I guess I've been programmed by the media and by the entertainment industry to like all this stuff. Perhaps. But I have enough sense to question a lot of what I hear and see. And to realize that not everything you see and hear is true. But it's the subconscious effects that the music has on us that we are blind to. I've had a couple talks with my buddy Jon about this and he's helped me understand a little better the psychology involved with the music we listen to. That's why I always take the time to read stuff like this and to discuss. Being able to have discussions like this is what will lead us to answering those questions that JAC posed.